In the reference Braun et al. patent there is described and claimed a system which provides for high density packaging of electronics equipment in an island configuration. Integrated circuit packages of the "leadless" variety, each having a heat sink member with at least one integral extension at an extremity thereof, are installed in receptacles or connectors. The package is located in the connector by means of a registration hole in the heat sink and a retention post within the connector. The connectors themselves are mounted on an interconnection medium and lie between, and in close proximity to, adjacent parallel sections of a cooling frame fastened to the interconnection medium. When installed in the connector, the IC package heat sink extension contacts the cooling frame section.
The insertion of the IC package into the connector may be accomplished by an assembler without the aid of tools. However, it has been found that the handling of the gold plated package "leads" with the fingers results in contamination and subsequent poor circuit operation, while the use of gloves by an assembler makes the mounting of the packages considerably more arduous.
Even though the heat sink member extends beyond the connector body, mechanical holding devices which grasp the extended portions of the periphery of the heat sink are unusable due to the surrounding structures in a fully assembled island. For example, in addition to the aforementioned cooling frame sections, pairs of elevated spaced-apart brackets are fastened to the cooling frame at respective opposite sides of the area on the cooling frame contacted by the heat sink portion of the mounted IC package. These brackets form part of a package hold-down assembly. Vacuum-actuated tools may be used for holding an IC package during assembly but these are unwieldly and undesirable from a production standpoint because they require a vacuum source, hose connections to the tool and valves which must be manipulated by the assembler for alternately applying and removing the vacuum forces.
What is required for the high volume assembly of IC packages into their associated connectors is a simple, yet efficient, low-cost tool for both the transfer of IC packages from a storage or dispensing location to the connector, and the insertion thereinto. The present invention fills this need.